Treatment of infected skin wounds is usually one of the easiest things we can do from a medical perspective. Unless it's a superbug which is another concern entirely-- but we'll keep it simple for this post.
Here's a short list of the treatment protocol.
1. Keep the wound from getting infected. This boils down to a couple of things. In the ER-- doing good wound irrigation for things like road rash and lacerations. Washing wounds physically removes the bacteria. If the bacteria aren't present-- they can't fester to produce infection. Once the wound is cleansed-- apply a topical antibiotic (like Neosporin or equivalent) to stem infection from developing.
2. Dressings should be changed once or twice daily. Unless it's saturated-- it can be left alone. The more things are mucked with-- sometimes the more apt they are to become infected. You introduce more bacteria by touching.
Okay-- say you've done all those really great things and it STILL gets infected.
One-- is it really infected? Sometimes, people assume that mild redness is infection (this should only be 1-2mm around the wound edges) when it really is normal healing process. If the redness extends beyond 1-2mm-- then there is more concern for infection.Other signs: pain, swelling, pus draining, foul smell, red streaks running from the wound, swollen lymph nodes near the area, and fever.
Treatment:
First question: Should the wound/abscess be drained? Drainage is good because, just like irrigation above, it removes the bacteria. Some MRSA wounds are being managed just this way-- with just drainage and no antibiotics-- which is good to help prevent more resistant strains of bacteria from forming.
Second question: Place on oral antibiotics-- but which one? This will be a good one to run by a doctor if it is important for the integrity of your ms. The most common one for surface skin infection is Keflex. But for abscesses-- maybe something more along the lines of Clindamycin.
Sue-- hoped this helped!!
0 comments:
Post a Comment